Dawn, and dirt, in Ecuador

The mountains surrounded me. Everywhere there were mountains.  And rain - lots of rain and mist.

I didn't really want to face Quito in the rain, and made an aborted attempted at going around the city, only to give up and eventually face the city traffic.  It wasn't too bad, after all, and I was soon heading south on the PanAmerican highway again.

While refuelling at Rosas, Colombia, I again had to decline yet another offer from a young gentleman, who wished to come a-travellin' with me! No thanks, matey!  He is one of several, of all ages, who have wanted to tag along, on the back seat, which doesn't exist!

Unlike Colombia, where there are special little "free" lanes for motos and bicycles through the toll booths, northern Ecuador charged the princely sum of 20cents for motos.  It's not the money, it's the sheer inconvenience of having to stop, drag out the purse, pay, get change, stuff it back in the tankbag, and get going again. But south of Quito, they showed a little more sense, and it was back to the little "free" lanes, like in Colombia, for motos again.

I stopped for the night just south of Quito, got a good night's sleep, and was up and on the road with the dawn.  Brilliant!  Cool to cold, I had to crack the ice off the bike cover before packing it away, and this just a couple hundred kms south of the Equator. Somehow, I'm not quite sure how, I must have taken a wrong turning, and ended up way off course, over in the west of the country. But I'd had an amazing ride through the early morning mist, the sun rising after a while, plodding through the twisting turning mountains, dodging all the trucks.  But it was a bugger being so far off course - not good for maintaining the day's riding planned distance.

Being the stubborn bitch that I am, I was determined to make good my mistake and go forward, rather than back.  So I pulled out the laptop and checked the mapping program again (still have no map for Ecuador!!)   Ahhh, there was a road through from there to there, that would get me back onto the PanAm near Cañar.  It didn't look very "major", but it would do, at a pinch.  So after several false starts, involving quite a few km, at finding this little road, I eventually got onto it, late in the afternoon, estimating that it was about 20-30km through to Cañar.  I'd make it easily, before dark, wouldn't I? 

Tootled along through a little village, and suddenly things didn't look so good. The pavement ended, and it became gravel, then WET, MUDDY gravel, then just plain MUD.  This was going uphill, into the sun, with semis and cars coming down the mountain twisting across the road to get the best track, hanging out around corners, making things very difficult for me.  But I plodded on, not willing to give in and admit defeat.  The mud finally ended, once we got to where the sun could reach most of the road surface and dry it out. So up and up I went, dodging the traffic and the potholes, and the deep wheel ruts, through a few tiny villages, noting with horror that I'd done about 50kms.  How much further was it??

Pottering around a corner, I came to a screaming halt.  OOPS!  There'd been a landslide, and the road was gone, replaced by a few logs covered in gravel.  Oh well, if all the semis were going across it, it should be OK for the bike, so I tentatively, very slowly, went across and continued upwards.  At last a signpost (very few and far between over here!) - oh, no! it was still 65km to Cañar!! I'd never make it before dark, surely?  Off I went, as quickly as I safely could, and the road eventually got a little better, then turned to pavement.  I could see cars on a road above and ahead of me, that MUST be the PanAm, surely?  Wishful thinking, it was merely the road I was on, twisting its way along the edge of the mountain.  This happened a couple more times, so I gave up hoping for the PanAm to appear.

But it did finally appear, only to become a worse surface than the little road I'd been on for so long!  Dusk was falling quickly, and I was rather happy to see the little town of Cañar, and find a bed, just as full dark fell.  Shame the hostal had no water the next morning!! Oh well, these things are sent to try us, right?

The next day was more of the mountains, rain and mist, twining round and round and back and forward, but slowly heading south.  The countryside was wonderful, with really steep hills and mountains everywhere.  What I found unbelieveable was the cultivation for crops on these incredibly steep slopes - tiny terraces only a few feet wide, layer upon layer, down the mountain sides.  Flowering trees and shrubs, wildflowers, trees and ferns.  There was everything imaginable in the way of vegetation.

The border with Peru appeared through the misty rain later that afternoon, and thankfully, it was an easy, quick crossing.